Crypto market sentiment has swung to one of its most bullish readings in more than a year even as bitcoin's price stalls just below the $80,000 mark, according to the Investing News Network's running crypto market recap.
The publication reports that the cryptocurrency market entered "extreme greed" territory for the first time since late 2024, after the Crypto Fear and Greed Index on CoinMarketCap hit 81 late on a Sunday evening. The index broke cleanly above the 80 threshold, which INN characterized as a signal of aggressive buying and strong conviction among traders after the market had spent nearly a year stuck in fear readings.
The speed of the reversal is the part market watchers have focused on. INN describes a 45-point surge over the preceding 30 days, calling it the fastest sentiment shift between extremes since CoinMarketCap began tracking the metric. Sentiment had bottomed at an extreme fear score of 5 on February 5, meaning the gauge completed a full round trip from one extreme to the other in less than six months.
The sentiment flip was driven primarily by a sharp move in bitcoin. INN reports the asset gained roughly 24 percent in a single week and expanded its market dominance relative to altcoins during the run. According to the recap, the breakout began when the US Treasury announced plans to double its long-bond buybacks to US$4 billion per operation starting September 9 — a liquidity-related development that traders read as supportive of risk assets broadly rather than as anything specific to digital assets.
That August advance broke a bearish trend that had defined much of the year, with bitcoin reaching nearly US$80,000 for the first time since May. INN attributes the move to a combination of factors including US$1.92 billion in exchange-traded fund inflows and a wave of short liquidations, in which leveraged bets against bitcoin were forcibly closed, adding mechanical buying pressure on the way up.
Momentum has since cooled into consolidation. In its recap for Wednesday, August 26, as of 10:00 p.m. UTC, INN listed bitcoin at US$78,451.20, down about one percent over the prior 24 hours. The publication frames the market's next move as hinging on whether sustained buying materializes at these levels, and points to mixed whale activity — large-holder accumulation and distribution pulling in different directions — as a complicating signal.
There are important caveats to a story built on a sentiment gauge. The Fear and Greed Index is a composite indicator that blends inputs such as volatility, momentum and trading volume into a single score between 0 and 100. It measures crowd positioning rather than the underlying health of networks, protocols or businesses, and historically it has been read by some traders as a contrarian signal, with elevated greed readings interpreted as a sign that positioning has become crowded. A high reading does not predict, guarantee or rule out any particular future price outcome, and past sentiment extremes have preceded both continued rallies and sharp reversals.
For readers tracking what comes next, the concrete items in the reporting are the scheduled September 9 expansion of Treasury long-bond buybacks, the trajectory of spot ETF flows after a strong stretch of inflows, and whether bitcoin's increased dominance over altcoins persists or unwinds. None of these are forecasts. They are simply the variables INN identifies as having shaped the current setup, and the ones most likely to influence how this consolidation phase resolves.
This is a news summary for general information only — not financial advice, and nothing here is a recommendation to buy, sell, or hold any asset. Always verify against the original source and do your own research before making a financial decision.
Source: Investing News Network · 2026-08-30
